Mano Ganeshan slams UNP Gen Sec's statement against decentralisation

by P. Krishnaswamy

UNP General Secretary Tissa Attanayake's statement that
decentralisation of power was no longer necessary as the LTTE has been
annihilated came under fire from Mano Ganeshan, human rights activist
and leader of the Democratic People's Front (DPF). In a recent interview
to the BBC Sinhala service, Attanayake was reported as saying "it is no
longer necessary to delve into centralised power into regions as there
are no armed militants any longer".

It is not only shocking but very unfortunate that the opposition
parliamentarian has made such a remark. It is also surprising that the
statement which was given wide publicity in the print media,
particularly the Tamil media, has not been countered by the party so
far, Ganeshan said.

Traditionally the UNP played an important role in the efforts to
evolve a political solution to the Tamil issue and the party has an
obligation by the Tamil-speaking people in the context of the fact that
a good percentage of both the Tamils and Muslims voted for it in past
elections, Ganeshan said. While the DPF is totally opposed to
undemocratic and violent means, to which the LTTE took recourse, to
resolve the Tamil issue, Attanayake's statement saying a political
solution is not currently necessary as the militants have been
eliminated is laughable because it ostensibly justifies the presence of
militancy, Ganeshan said.

Deputy Minister of Resettlement Vinayagamurthy Muralidharan a.k.a.
Karuna Amman in criticising the UNP statement has stated that President
Mahinda Rajapaksa has admitted the need for a political solution to the
Tamils and the Government was working on formulating a suitable model of
power devolution. The process of holding discussions with foreign
missions in Colombo on this matter is continuing.

The last in the series of discussions were recently held with the
American Embassy and prior to that discussions were held with the
Italian Embassy, he said.